Interview: Hitler's Silver Box by Dr. Allen Malnak

It is with great pleasure I introduce Dr. Allen Malnak. Below is some background information on Dr. Malnak. After learning about him I was compelled to conduct an interview to find out more about his amazing book.

Following his internship and residency, Dr. Malnak served as chief of internal medicine at U.S. Army Hospital, Fort Sill, OK, and then was a clinical investigator in liver disease at Mount Sinai Hospital, Chicago. He was a board-certified internist in the Chicago area for more than 35 years. He was a clinical instructor at Chicago Medical School for eight years and an assistant clinical professor at the Stritch School of Medicine of Loyola University for 25 years. Dr. Malnak was medical director of a number of medical organizations, including Principle Health Care of Illinois and the emergency department of Chicago’s Mount Sinai Hospital. His interest in the Holocaust was sparked by the fact that his father came to the USA from Lithuania at age 16, leaving behind a large family. All the men, women and children of that family were sent to a death camp by the Nazis and exterminated.

Thank you Nicole for interviewing me on my novel.

Can you explain why you wrote Hitler’s Silver Box?

The project started while taking a local fiction writing course taught by an outstanding novelist and previous short story editor of “The New Yorker,” Hollis Alpert. One of several topics for a short story was “A Silver Box.” Perhaps because my father’s entire Lithuanian family had been murdered by the Nazis, I wrote the story about a concentration camp prisoner who was forced to make a silver box as a birthday present for Hitler.

The teacher suggested it had the making of a novel, and I changed the protagonist to a nephew of the victim and while the silversmith’s experience in the camp is told in his journal, basically the historical thriller is about a search for the box and it’s horrendous contents with the young ER physician going up against present day Nazis, who are willing to torture or kill to get their hands on the silver box, which his uncle was able to bury near Prague as the Second World War was coming to an end some fifty years before the novel begins.

Is anything in your book based on real life experiences or purely all imagination?

The emergency room scene as well as a road accident scene were based on my personal experience. Also I suffer from claustrophobia in tunnels just like Bruce in the novel. While the scientific information that would result in a worldwide Nazi resurgence is fictional, it’s based on many scientific endeavors actually ongoing during the war that Hitler counted on to eventually help the Nazis win.

What was your favorite chapter to write and why?

My favorite chapter was Chapter 35. It was the climactic chapter, and Bruce was in a very tight spot with the odds stacked against him. Figuring out if there was a way out required a great deal of thought. Bruce was wounded, bleeding, unarmed and trapped in a room against a vicious armed opponent.

The most difficult chapters for me to write were the two that made up Max Bloomberg’s journal. Max is Bruce’s uncle and the silversmith who was forced while a prisoner in Theresienstadt concentration camp to make the silver box. Many aspects of Max’s fight for survival were gut wrenching. The provenance of the silver he had to use almost drove him and me mad.

Did you learn anything from writing your book and what was it?

I learned a great deal about life in Theresienstadt concentration camp and despite the fact that it was not literally a death camp, prisoners were treated cruelly and often died of starvation as well as many diseases such as Typhus. Many victims were transferred from Theresienstadt, the so-called model concentration camp, to a death camp and murdered.

I also needed to learn a great deal about the art and craft of silversmithing, since the production and vile contents of the silver box was at the heart of the story.

Naturally, as happens with every author of a historical novel, one learns and reviews a great deal more about the era than is ever used in the actual writing. For example, I’ve always been interested in the psychology of Nazi physicians who were involved in a great deal of planning and carrying out of the concentration camp murders, as well as undertaking experiments on prisoners that were more torture than of medical value. I studied more about this topic and even wrote Bruce’s reactions to it, but decided to totally remove it from this novel.

Is there a message in your novel that you want readers to grasp?

Despite what the world knows about the horrors of Nazi Germany, there still are in many communities of our great nation neo-Nazis, white supremacists and Ku Klux Klan members wanting nothing more than to finish what Hitler couldn’t. Perhaps Hitler’s Silver Box will throw a little light on just how devoted to evil these types are.

Name one entity that you feel supported you outside of family members.

My wife was and will always be my main support with her encouragement and love. Second to that are members of local writing groups. Their reactions and feedback is invaluable.

If you had to do it all over again, would you change anything in Hitler’s Silver Box?

Probably not.

What are your current projects?

I’m seriously considering a sequel. I purposely left some loose ends to keep the option open.

A SPECIAL GREETING FROM FRAN DRESCHER

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